Toledo Hospital Birth

This was the first birth I attended as a photographer at Toledo Hospital. The staff was so accommodating and friendly with this family. Mom was as comfortable as she could be thanks to the wonderful nurses. It was wonderful to see the staff and how caring they were with the family. Check out their whole birth session here.

Before & After

Documenting a birth is a fast paced job and I admit that my settings on this photo were not perfect.This was soon after mom had delivered her baby and the spotlight was still on above her bed. Because of that bright light, that part of my photo is blown out. Thankfully, I could recover that in photoshop by reducing the exposure in that area. Ideally, that area would be properly exposed but balancing different exposures within one image is very tricky.

Since this image was shot with only the available light in the hospital room, I metered off their faces. When shooting in low light, I don’t like to underexpose too much. I admit I chronically underexpose images though so I’m usually adjusting that in post processing.

This image has a few issues with the white balance. My subjects look a little too orange/yellow. While white balance can be fixed in post, I decided to convert this instead. I knew since there were quite a few bright and dark areas, this would make a great black and white. In ACR (adobe camera raw), I changed the HSL panel to grayscale. On the basic panel, I adjusted the exposure, contrast and shadows. I also added a touch of clarity. The finished image was one of  my favorites. The conversion really highlights their bond, don’t you think?

Settings

f 1.8; ss 1/400; iso 2000

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